This is my official book review for Dina Sleiman’s new book Dauntless. So, if you want to read it first (Though I will not put any spoilers), I suggest you do so now.

This book was exciting from the start. I instantly fell in love with the writing-style and the topic. Though I’m not a big fan of Robin Hood (because of the confusing writing), I was skeptical when beginning. My mistake. Dauntless’s style was spunky, to the point, and modern… while also having traditional Robin Hood dialogue.

The story was so well-plotted, I couldn’t put it down! This is basically how my afternoons were spent:

Another thing I have to mention was the characters. The development in the characters was something to look at and say, “MAH GOODNESS, THAT’S JUST PERFECT!” And in all honestly, that statement is true. It was so well-done, I fell in love with Timothy Grey almost instantly. He was so full of ambition and love for Merry (the lady), it made me swoon (and frankly, very jealous…). Merry, on the other hand, was my role-model as a young lady the moment she was seen in the book (page 1, if you were wondering). She was so independent, and smart, and pretty, and epic, and strong, and kind, and so forth. I was like, “I WANNA BE HER!” Though I must admit, I wanted to slap her sometimes. But that’s all a part of the story….By the end of the book, I was all like:

For real, I devoured this book.

So this book deserves a wonderful…

drum roll, please…

5 RIBBONS!!! I WANT TO SEE THIS BOOK AS A MOVIE SOMEDAY.

Thank you to the publisher, Bethany House, for the opportunity to review this book! 😀

I’m sure many of you in the United States watched the Super Bowl the other night. Frankly, I don’t watch a whole lot of football, if any, but when I do, I eat way too much.

In a nutshell, I watch ads and eat food on Super Bowl Sunday. It’s my thing. So, here are my favorite* Big Game Day ads of 2015:

*These are not in any specific order, since there are too many of them to even think about.

Let’s start with the tortoise and the hare ad. If you missed it, you can watch it here. I especially enjoyed this one because the turtle got the girl in the end. Take that, mister Hare!! TURTLES RULE!

Another awesome advertisement was the Bold Dad, from Toyota. It was about a father who was there for his daughter, and it was pretty inspiring.

Liam Neeson’s commercial for Clash of Clans was pretty epic as well. If you didn’t see it, check it out.

Although this one wasn’t a “favorite”, it was still pretty strange because we were having TV problems right before the game had started. This ad showed the stadium, but then immediately blacked out, followed by a few moments of black and silence. During those seconds, I stood up and said “I’ll be downstairs, call me up when you guys fix it,” only to find out that it WASN’T an ad at all!

I’d have to say my least favorite would be the one where the kid is listing off his dreams, and then says that he died, so he could not accomplish those goals. I literally yelled at the television and my family after this, proceeded by nightmares.

SO, as you can see from the title, this blog has got some weight. And I mean it.

Last summer, I won the State Games in my state in my favorite and competitive sport: Swimming. This also means that I qualified for the State Games of America being held in Lincoln, Nebraska in 2015. But there was one complication: To compete, I had to become a USA Swimming member.

That was a problem for me, since I wasn’t able to do that.

I approached my coaches, asking if it would even be possible to join USA Swimming as a stand-alone athlete. They said no. I, bummed, figured that I was not going to attend the SGA in the summer.

Then, I looked into it a bit more. The moment I got an email, I used my new form of messaging to contact some people associated with my state’s division of USA Swimming. Soon enough, I received a call.

Nice lady on the phone: “Yeah, you can absolutely join USA Swimming! You just have to jump through a few hoops, is all!”

Me:

After being connected with other coaches, directors, and other people, I was a USA Swimming member, all set for my first meet.

I don’t know about you, but I saw that there were just doors opening and opening to new experiences. When I went to my coaches to tell them the good news, they didn’t seem to excited.

BUT WHO CARES? God’s giving me a baton in this relay of my life, and it’s exhilarating! 😀

So now I have the motivation and the preparations to race in a real USA Swimming meet, and I’m now capable of going to the SGA this summer!

Now what?

I have to swim.

Has anyone ever told you that you COULDN’T do something, then rise above the statement and accomplish it? How so?

See you soon!

~#1kid

(Credit to Christine Caine’s book Unstoppable for the reference of a divine relay. Reading it now, and looooving it!)

This post is about CAMP ANIME!!!!! I went last year, but this year was waaaay better in so many ways!

Firstly, I cosplayed this year. If you don’t know what cosplaying is, then basically it’s where people dress up as a character and then hang out with other people that are dressed as a character (perhaps from the same franchise) and have fun. It’s pretty cool when you see how hard fans work to make sure their costumes are just right before a convention.

This year, I cosplayed as Fem!Japan from Hetaia. Honestly, I looked like a really strange girl in traditional Asian clothing with short black hair with a flower in it. I looked pretty different with the short hair, and anyone who already knew me was like “WHAAAA YOU CUT YOUR HAIR NO!!” No, I did not cut my hair. Wigs, my friends, can help you with your cosplays.

Secondly, I had friends with me, and I met a ton of people. I had told my friend about Camp Anime, and she was extremely excited almost immediately. Soon enough, we’re both signed up and psyched!

The two of us met tons of really cool people. It was amazing how many Hetalians were there! Now, we talk all the time!

Thirdly, my siblings and I took part in some really fun panels. One of my favorites was the Movie-Making panel. We had 15 minutes to plot our small story, 15 minutes to film, and 15 minutes to edit our videos. The whole idea was two adults were reminiscing about their first convention, and then there’s a flashback from the convention. It was genius on our friend Austin’s part! This is what it turned out to look like: http://youtu.be/Xn6YbAruJqQ

My friends and I actually ran the Hetalia panel on the spot! We also took part it Live Angry Birds, Sushi Making (Mom’s favorite), and a few others.

The setup of the convention was that of a camp… Actually, it was a camp. We were in the woods, there was a lake, there were cabins where overnight campers slept, and a huge dining hall. My sister and I got the chance to go on a pedal boat, which was very fun.

If you want to see more: Check out this video that sums up the whole weekend! http://youtu.be/g_vUarlESG0

Thank you to all that made Camp Anime possible, to all of my friends, and to Mr. Anthony Santos for the videos. Camp Anime 2014 would not be as amazing as it was without all of you! 😀

The first I’d like to remind you all about the past events of the summer:
I attended training camp in early July, and learned much more about my favorite sport of all: Swimming. My left rotator cuff healed with proper training and rest. I had the State Games coming up, and the National Games to qualify for…
So what happened at the State Games?
Sunday morning I arrived at the Aquatic Center at a college. It’s a nice complex, for sure! We checked in, and I warmed up by doing some of the drills the camp had taught me.
I was nervous, but I knew I had the tournament in the bag. My only problem was swimming against the older kids. See, when there aren’t enough people in an event, they merge the age groups so the meet can go by quicker and everyone can go home. But someone had told me that qualifications and medals were awarded by race, not age group. I began freaking out, and becoming so nervous and upset, I was pretty angered by the time the meet had begun.
Turns out, that lady didn’t know what she was talking about and I would be okay.
In my first event, the 50 yard Freestyle, I swam 29.34 seconds. It was a personal best, and I placed first! In my 100 yard Breastroke, I placed second with a meh time of 1:33.15. The girl in front of me was on fire. Literally. The smoke was unbearable. In my third and final event, I swam a winning 1:07.88. Not a best, but it’s good!
That means I qualified for all three of my events in the State Games of America in 2015. Only one thing to do: TRAIN HARDER. Next year, I’ll be one year older, and ready for more competition, and my times will have decreased even more. Believe me, I can’t wait.

My amazing brother, FantasyFan, has joined the swim team! After years of begging him to try out, he’s finally agreed to come for a swim. J

Secondly, I went to training camp.

The Nike Swim Camp was the greatest training experience I’ve ever had. The coaches were head college swimming coaches and the girls’ counselors were actually still swimming in their universities.

Personally, I’ve never done anything like this before so, of course, I was nervous! Turns out, there was absolutely NOTHING to be worried about.

The food there was AWESOME. Three gigantic meals per day and a truckload of pasta. For real. Some of us campers would say as we stuffed our faces, “#Carbsarelife.”

That’s another thing, the campers. I met quite a few new friends this week and we still talk to each other all the time. Whenever I go places, I always stay on the lookout for other swimmers that understand what it’s like to be stuck at a swim meet every weekend, or the joy of winning by a millisecond. I met those people and I am so glad I did! I also would like to mention I had the coolest roommate in the world (shout out to my roommate).

The most important thing I learned is that technique is more important to practice than the stroke itself. Apparently, my elbows weren’t coming up high enough in Freestyle, and my arms were coming too high in my Butterfly, and my head needs to stay down in Breastroke, and my right arm needs to come over my head in my fly/breast turn, etc. The list goes on.

So seriously, check out Nike Swim Camps or any USSC Sports camps here!:

Hi! I was recently asked to write a review of the book, The Manual to Manhood by Jonathan Catherman. So, if you don’t want to read this, that’s fine. It’s just a book review about a book that tells the responsibilities that teen boys need to grow into before they become men.

The Manual to Manhood was an amazing book. It’s a guide for young men to learn how to live in the adult world. I seriously appreciate the simple instructions that the book gives on pretty complex issues. It goes from simple “How to Do Laundry” or “How to to Cook an Egg” to “How to Write a Resume” and “How to Get a Date.” It deals with everything a guy needs to know and to do his part as the male role model of his future family.All in all, this book was extremely helpful and I hope that every guy can read it while he is still a teen. I know this book will be a good resource as I become a man.

Thank you for reading this. I hope I can write again soon. Look for more book reviews on Rd2Gold!

I’m guest blogging again! Last time I was here, it was October. It’s been quite a half-year for me, all really fun and other stuff. So, let’s get started!

First on the list is BOOKS! I’ve become a book addict since I last spoke on Rd2Gold. Seriously. It started a while back when I read the Book Thief. After I read that, I felt the need to read a lot more, and more, MORE!!!! So after I became a book addict, I started to read Harry Potter. Mind = BLOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT WAS SO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Second are Marvel movies. For most of my life (until February 13, 2014) I could really have cared a lot less about Captain America and Iron Man. They kind of didn’t have any appeal to me. So then #1kid came home from the library with three movies. One was the Avengers. So now I like it. A lot. Now I have seen all of Phase One and Two (so far). My favorite one out of all of them is Captain America: The Winter Soldier. And I’m extremely excited for The Amazing Spider-Man 2!

Thirdly is all the movies I’ve been seeing. #1kid may have told you about some of these. But yes, there’s been a lot. The Book Thief (of course), The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, The Monuments Men, Ender’s Game, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, The Lego Movie, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and most recently, Heaven is for Real. All of these were very good.

Fourthly, I’m still doing archery. I’ve been really good at it!

And lastly but not leastly is Bernard and Scratch. Bernard and Scratch is a novella I am plotting currently. It’s about a boy (Bernard) who meets a six foot, 12-year-old monster (Scratch).

So, that’s how I’ve been in the past six months. It was quite epic.

If you have any questions on my favorite books or other questions about books, questions about my favorites list of Marvel movies, or any questions on Bernard and Scratch, please comment.